eslatts' 225 Mixed Reef + Fish Room

eslatts11

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Moving my build thread over here from another forum. You'll see a lot of posts that happened over the past couple years. I started this remodel at the end of 2018 :)



Started on my fish tank room build this past weekend! Sort of went with the its easier to ask for forgiveness than permission theory, think shes coming around
:D
Will hopefully support a 180g+ display tank somewhere down the road.

Planning on doing an epoxy floor at the moment. Was thinking about doing a tile floor but the epoxy may be easier and more cost effective. I am also going to install a new 20 amp breaker just for the room to power all of my pumps, lights, heaters, reactors, etc. Had a heck of a time trying to run the 12-2 this past Saturday. In my tri-level home, its almost impossible to get to the far end bedroom in the basement with a run (panel is located on the other side of the house in the garage). Both 14-2 wires I chased up to the attic above my second story ended up only stopping on the second story and not dropping down all the way to the basement. Still never found how or where the dang basement 15 amp breaker is ran down from. I ended up finding a gap in my living room wall that will allow me to drop it into my hot water heater room then I am going to run it between the basement ceiling and 2nd story floor along the central air ducting. I found a nice RJ11 phone wire going to my soon to be fish tank room that I can use as a fish wire. Only thing I'm waiting on now to do the run, is a dang 54" auger drill bit to drill through this pesky horizontal 2" x 4" they put in between the stud. I was able to tie into my basements bathroom faucet drain line and hot/cold tonight.

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eslatts11

eslatts11

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That size of fish room is going to be a dream. My one suggestion is to find a place to put a control panel for a future apex or controller. I have my apex and all modules mounted to a piece of wood I mounted on the wall behind the tank. Makes it easy to access and looks impressive:)
Jeff


Yep definitely going to do this. I was thinking right on the wall above the sump. Right now I am trying to decide how many gang's of outlets ill need to put there for the module mount board and how many to put on the wall behind the fish tank. I know i'll be plugging in mostly a combination of a few Neptune Apex EB8's and EB4's - so I can't think ill need that many outlets at the wall? Probably will follow suite for an outlet height of 48" on the module mount wall which the exterior basement walls already have them at. I will remove the current 1 gang outlet at 1' foot up, that is just asking for trouble being right next to the sump.

Can anyone recommend how many gang's of outlets and at what height for behind a 180g (72x24x24) on 36" tall stand. Once the tank is in place I will certainly need the ability to access the outlets, so between 36" and 60" is kind of a dead zone.


Got the 12-2 line ran today for the dedicated 20amp breaker, holy crap was that a PITA. I've ran wiring before where there was no drywall in yet in a remodeled home, that was easy but this... this was difficult. Had to buy a specialized 54" auger bit to reach down inside of a wall and drill through a horizontal 2" x 4" going from the first story attic straight to the water heater / sump room in the basement. Also, purchased a WIFI boroscope snake camera that aided in the fishing of wire through the auger holes. Got it done though!!

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eslatts11

eslatts11

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Drywalled yesterday:
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Mudded first layer with tape today:
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Used a 6" x 9" access panel to run my piping through the wall. I found that I can actually do a full pipe straight through, so my plan is to just use a 45 degree fitting at both ends and will allow for less flow interference (no need for 90s)!
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eslatts11

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Finished up the mudding/sanding and paint is finished. All new 20amp outlets have been installed and old outlets replaced. Norwesco 75gal storage tanks came in for my mixing station and just started the flooring! I ended up going with waterproof vinyl plank flooring instead of finishing with an epoxy floor.

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eslatts11

eslatts11

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Looks like it is coming along nicely.
:)

Looks really nice so far - Your finished Salt room should look great!


Thanks guys!

Finished up the flooring yesterday and baseboard tonight! Just need to fill some corners and nail holes with some white wood filler then should be all set.

Next on the agenda:
  • Install slop sink
  • Mount RODI
  • Mixing station stand + plumbing
  • Create workbench

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eslatts11

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Thanks guys! Little by little im getting there.

Just received my quarter inch glass baffles from Kettering Glass Inc today. The pieces look real nice, polished well and right to spec. I have a 75 gallon Aqueon tank from Petco that I got for $71 dollars during the dollar per gallon sale 2 years ago that I still have been waiting to use. They let me combine my $10 dollar off coupon with the dollar per gallon sale.. what a steal, I don't even think they include the 75g's in the sale anymore. Picked up some GE 100% silicon #1 from home depot that I will be installing the baffles with.

For sump design here is what I came up with on Fusion 360 (flow left to right) - first two baffles on the left will house an egg crate shelf for filter floss (not pictured), the second and third baffles are just bubble traps. Anyone know the pros/cons to the two different styles of bubble traps? Outer baffles low and center baffle high vs. the two outer baffles being high and the center low.


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eslatts11

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Sorry for the delayed updates! Finished the 75g sump baffles up a couple weeks ago! Custom ordered a eurobraced low-iron 225g with Synergy Reef 16" shadow overflow, 72"x30"x24" (LxWxH), from Crystal Dynamics Aquariums and should be expecting it sometime in July!! I am planing to go with an extruded aluminum stand from Framing Tech as well.

Here's some pics of the sump build:
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eslatts11

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Long overdue for an update!!

Extruded aluminum stand from framing tech came in and put together - top & bottom boards mounted.

Orphek Atlantiks hung using retractable grow light hanger and RMS ecotech rails with custom fabricated angle iron piece.

Created a replica tank back and roughed in the plumbing!















 
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eslatts11

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Thanks guys! Yeah, 80/20 seems to be pretty affordable for a nice sturdy stand.

With the help of friends and family, finally got the tank moved into place Sunday morning! We first wheeled it on dollies across the yard on 4'x8' sheets of OSB to the back basement window. I made a 2'x4' piece of wood wrapped with carpet and placed it on the window sill so we could slide the tank on it. To fit it through the window we had to rotate it onto its back. We first tried to carry the tank through the window but then quickly realized the transition of weight once we pull it off the window sill would have been to much all at once. So we pulled the stand over to the window and placed dollies on the stand top. Once the tank was more than halfway through the window we set it onto the dolly and rolled it to the end of the stand. Then we lifted the tank straight up, pulled the dollies and rotated it right side up. With the tank on the stand, we lifted the stand and tank together ever so slightly and moved it about 6 inches at a time until it was in place. Lastly, we lifted up the tank and pulled the blanket out.














 
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eslatts11

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Got the sand rinsed yesterday, did a mix of Topic Eden meso flakes and mini flakes. My three big pieces of reef saver large foundation rock came in along with my E-Marco 400 mortar so I was able to get the aquascaping done tonight and sand in the tank! Have a full 75gal norwesco tank of saltwater mixing and my rodi tank almost full again, will be getting it wet tomorrow!










 
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eslatts11

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On my third round of quarantine currently, but this is pic was my setup between my first and second round. The 40g breeder on the left proved to be just too big for a quarantine. I found it was hard to maintain with copper just because of the sheer water volume:


Current pic of tank with about 11 fish so far and more to come!
 
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eslatts11

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Completed the light shroud, paneling on the extruded aluminum stand and did some cable management along the back wall:


12 fish so far everyone very healthy!


Added a 57 watt UV sterilizer in-line with my return plumbing along with the neptune apex 1" flow sensor to dial it in. Replaced the loud mag drive for my lifereef skimmer with the same pump as my return, the Maxspect 12k. I think its actually producing even better skimmate now:


Just readied the quarantine tanks tonight. The tang gang is on its way!


Heading to the CORA frag sway this weekend and am going to start putting my first corals in the tank soon!
 
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Big update! I decided the sand bed had to go. I could already see that regularly cleaning the sand bed was going to be a major pain and I couldn't quite get the flow high as I would have liked without blowing sand every where.. Pulled all of the water out of the tank into several 32gal garbage cans, pulled the LR and placed it into the various garbage cans and took my vacuum and sucked the bottom clean! Also was able to do a little bit of a re-work on the aquascape.

After all that quarantine, ich still managed to somehow get into the tank. Taking the sand bed out at this same time actually worked out well because it was super easy to catch the fish once the water level got really low. Started the 76 day fallow period a couple weeks ago. All fish being treated again in copper.

On a brighter note, have filled my tank with corals and have the ph, calc and alk steady now. Currently have alk around 8dkh and calcium hovering around 410. Trying out All-For-Reef, but a dose of 50mls per day currently means their largest bottle will only last me 20 days. If this stuff continues to work well I just may continue to use it until they come to market with the powdered version.

With the increased photo period and intensity, I am having a little bit of a GHA breakout on some of my rocks. I have not fed the tank much at all since going fallow. I am thinking its a combination of two things, 1. those specific rocks are leeching phosphates and two potential die off from some of my CUC. Phosphates are reading 0.03, a few days ago and now 0.04 today. Running the last of my regular GFO currently, in a few days once I get my high capacity GFO in, ill run a full canister of that in hopes to lower even more, or at least suck up as much of the leeching phosphates as I can. Nitrates are hovering around 4ppm based on my Red Sea Pro Nitrate test kit. I am having a hard time telling if my readings are accurate though. I run the normal 0 - 4 range test and my color looks to be on the 4ppm or maybe higher. So because of this I run the diluted test (4 - 64 range), and the color looks just like the lowest color level in that range of 4ppm. So either I am doing something wrong or my Nitrates are really at 4ppm. Not sure if anyone has experience with this test kit?

Here are some update pics:
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eslatts11

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Long overdue for a progress update. Snapped some picks tonight after cleaning all 4 walls. Coraline is starting to come in, especially on the bottom of the tank. Elegance coral has not been looking too good lately so I moved it to the bottom right corner for less flow and less light. I also put a cage around it because I think my butterfly might be picking at it!

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A worm with high fashion and practical utility: Have you ever kept feather dusters in your reef aquarium?

  • I currently have feather dusters in my tank.

    Votes: 64 36.8%
  • Not currently, but I have had feather dusters in my tank in the past.

    Votes: 59 33.9%
  • I have not had feather dusters, but I hope to in the future.

    Votes: 25 14.4%
  • I have no plans to have feather dusters in my tank.

    Votes: 26 14.9%
  • Other.

    Votes: 0 0.0%
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